1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and an apparatus for determining installation locations of fault indicators and, more particularly, to a method and an apparatus for determining installation locations of fault indicators in a power network.
2. Description of the Related Art
A power company generally transmits power to the user ends via a power network. To smoothly transmit the power to the user ends, the power company generally installs a plurality of fault indicators at detection points of the power network to monitor the power transmission. If any nodes or feed lines in the power network malfunction and cause outage, a fault indicator near the fault location generates a fault signal and sends the fault signal to a processing center through the intermediate fault indicators between the processing center and the fault indicator sending the fault signal. The processing center judges the fault location of the power network based on the fault signal received.
Since the fault signal is transmitted through the intermediate fault indicators one by one, the communication quality between two adjacent fault indicators is one of the important factors of monitoring power transmission. Conventionally, the installation locations of the fault indicators are determined by the workers of the power company, and the fault indicators are located in places that are easy to install or observe. Namely, the communication quality between two adjacent fault indicators is not the first priority. Thus, the communication quality may be degraded due to the terrain, distance, etc. As a result, the next fault indicator may not be able to receive or detect the fault signal and, thus, determines that the previous fault indicator malfunctions and sends a wrong fault signal back to the processing center. These situations result in degradation of the power transmission monitoring. Thus, a need exists for a method and an apparatus for finding out the best installation locations of the fault indicators.